Cubs Claim Max Ramirez

Max Ramirez has been claimed on waivers for the second time in six days. This time, the Cubs claimed him from the Red Sox, according to the teams. The Red Sox claimed Ramirez from the Rangers last week after working to acquire him for Mike Lowelllast offseason. For the second consecutive winter, the Red Sox have had Ramirez within their grasp only to lose him.

Ramirez will restore some of the catching depth the Cubs lost when they sent Robinson Chirinos to the Rays in last week's Matt Garzatrade. Ramirez appeared in 28 games for the Rangers last year and posted a .217/.341/.348 line in 85 plate appearances. The 26-year-old has spent most of his seven-year pro career in the minors, where he has a .298/.396/.476 line.

Before the 2010 season, Baseball America wrote that Ramirez is "a plus hitter who works the count and drives the ball to all fields" when healthy. However, the publication described the catcher as a below-average defender with below-average arm strength and well below-average running speed.

Huh? This story is completely unclear? Did the SOX put him on waivers or did the CUBS also claim him?
It SOUNDS like the SOX put him on waivers to try to pass him through and reassign him to the minors but the story is so vauge I’m not really sure…

Thr Red Sox claimed Max Ram last week and to make room for Okajima on the 40 man today Ramirez was waived then claimed by the Cubs for their 40 man roster. He has no option years left so he may be waived again during spring training if he doesn’t have a solid showing at camp. March 14th (30 days termination pay) and 28th (45 days termination pay) are the two unconditional release waiver deadline days.

Funny that much of the hand-wringing over whether the Cubs paid too much for Garza centered on 27 year-old Robinson Chirinos, who the Cubs have done a decent job of replacing for the cost of a waiver claim on 26 year-old Ramirez.

For starters, you’re making things up because you liked the deal and need an excuse to take a passive-aggressive swipe at those who don’t. Chirinos was one of the pieces that people care LEAST about getting rid of; it’s Archer and Lee that there is “hand-wringing” about. Chirinos was a nice piece, but obviously blocked by Soto and there is still Castillo and Brenly in the farm. He was trade bait whether he went to Tampa Bay or the Rangers or somewhere else.

Second, even if we assume your fallacy is true, claiming a catcher who can’t catch is hardly a replacement for Chirinos. Unless of course you think a below-average catcher with below-average arm is actually going to stick at catcher. Yeah, we replaced his spot on the roster for about ten minutes; with no options left, we’re almost certainly going to end up waiving him and hoping for the best anyway.

And as far as your absolutely ridiculous comments below this, he wasn’t traded for Fuld and Guyer and you damn well know it. The Rays got what they got. Wanting to replace the prospects we lost is hardly as stupid as you make it out to be, particularly when YOU are the one who started that line of thinking and the person who responded was obviously joking and it isn’t going to happen. The deal is done. If they’re somehow magically able to replace everything they gave away for free, then lulz at the teams who are being idiots and letting prospects of that caliber through. It has nothing to do with Garza or Tampa Bay.

Sometimes posts are only about what they are about. Like here: all I was saying was the Cubs essentially replaced one old-ish catching prospect with a promising bat for another. Even taking into account defensive differences, it’s really closer to gaining back that value than any Cubs fan had a right to expect from a waiver claim. That is it. That is what I am saying.

I didn’t say that Chirinos and Ramirez were of precisely equal value or that this somehow balances out the degree to which the Cubs overpaid for Garza. Supposing that I secretly believe these things and getting angry at me for them is just being hostile for the sake of having something to say.

As for the bit about people wringing their hands over Chirinos. I’m not making up anything, just referring to how so many commenters focused their frustration on the trade on Chirinos. (Wasn’t there also a Fangraphs piece on the trade fixating almost exclusively in Chirinos?) So many folks seem to recognize that including someone like Archer was a given, but get pushed over the edge at the thought of giving up a possibly ready-for-prime-time catcher. And that’s all I was speaking about. I didn’t attempt to characterize ALL reaction to the trade as fitting this mold. You could get mad at me for doing that, but since I didn’t, it’s an odd use of your time and ours.

As for the “absolutely ridiculous comments” below this… Criminy, how did you miss that those were *supposed* to be ridiculous? I was kidding thejerkstore for saying that the Cubs should follow up this claim with one for a 22 y/o SP and a 20 y/o SS. Because if you really think the Cubs would only be breaking even if they hadn’t lost Archer and Lee, Fuld and Guyer are what’s left. And obviously, that’s taking it too far. Hence, my joke.

You see, I could have gone off and taken thejerkstore’s tossed-off comments overly literally or gotten weirdly angry about them, but instead I just ribbed him with a one-liner.

You might try lightening up yourself.

I will never understand what fuels the people who seem to expect every tossed off comment or one-liner to be fully annotated and footnoted, with every shade of every aspect discussed at length, lest you provoke their rage.

Crikey. Don’t you see how boring these overly detailed posts are for everybody except the two guys butting heads? Maybe we could just give people a little credit and take small points for what they are. No?

I guess they needed a spot for Oki, but I wonder what made them keep Wagner over Ramirez? My only thought is that the sox see Ramirez as a DH only and weren’t willing to hold a spot for him based on that.

Wagner has options left, Ramirez doesn’t. Wagner can also catch regularly at AAA, while Ramirez can’t. I agree with you — I thought it would be Wagner as Ramirez has far more MLB upside, but it appears Theo rolled the dice trying to sneak him through.

The Cubs couldn’t claim Ramirez a week ago without waiving and possibly losing another player of value. But after moving the crudload of prospects in the Garza trade, they had two vacancies on their 40-man roster. The Sox had to DFA someone to make room for Okajima once his contract became official, but I really thought it would be Mark Wagner.

Why Wagner? The Sox have been high on him for years for his defensive and game calling abilities. He’s yet to even get a chance at the Majors. It wouldn’t make any sense to just simply give up on him before giving him a chance.

Because Wagner will never, ever hit at the major league level. Yes, he’s a plus defender, but he’s purely a guy they can call up in case of an emergency. In terms of his ceiling, he’s about 5th among Sox catching prospects right now — behind Exposito, Lavarnway, Federowicz and Ibarra.

Not a bad thought, but I think he was expendable because both Anderson (if he shows he can still hit after a down year last year) and Lavarnway (if he doesn’t pan out at catcher) would be ahead of him as an Ortiz replacement, both of them having more offensive upside than Ramirez.

Thats what I don’t get, if the Cubs plan on converting him to a 1B thats gonna be hard without any options, unless they stick Castillo down in AAA to start and same with Hill, then carry him as the back up for Soto and Pena..But even that isn’t a great plan

Maybe he is the back-up at 1st base, emergency 3rd catcher and pinch hitter.

Here is a move for Hendry to make. Sign Soriano to be the right handed set up guy for Marmol. He is also your closer for when Marmol forgets how to throw strikes.
Move Cashner to your 5th starter and see what you can get for Gorzelanny and Wells in a deal with Detroit.

Wood was a great signing for the money, but do you trust him as your go to set up guy over a 6 month long season?
I agree the Cubs won’t spend the money, but with Derrick Lee’s , Ted Lilly’s, and Xavier Nady’s money coming off the books this year, and even more next year, I think the money could be there.

Maybe he is the back-up at 1st base, emergency 3rd catcher and pinch hitter.

Here is a move for Hendry to make. Sign Soriano to be the right handed set up guy for Marmol. He is also your closer for when Marmol forgets how to throw strikes.
Move Cashner to your 5th starter and see what you can get for Gorzelanny and Wells in a deal with Detroit.

Not a bad replacement for Chirinos if he can stay at catcher. Admittedly that’s a big IF. He may even have the better bat. We don’t need a starting catcher anyway. We just need a guy who can spell Soto once in a while and maybe be a good bat off the bench.

i wonder of he can back up 1st base. not sure if the cubs have a plan for that yet, unless they stick with baker. over the last few years we have had countless options to back it up, nady, fox, hoffpauir, ward, derosa. anybody heard what the plan is? might be something to ask at the cubs convention this weekend.

i wonder of he can back up 1st base. not sure if the cubs have a plan for that yet, unless they stick with baker. over the last few years we have had countless options to back it up, nady, fox, hoffpauir, ward, derosa. anybody heard what the plan is? might be something to ask at the cubs convention this weekend.

I think the Cubs are gonna check out Ramirez to see what he might be, and depending, might move him in a deal this spring. I think Koyie Hill was Piniella’s favorite and won’t be on the Major League roster. If Ramirez makes the team, Castillo will be back at AAA where he can continue to work on his hitting. It’s not bad to have too many as long as they’re decent.

I like this move. The Cubs fully lack any offensive thump from the right side off the bench, and Ramirez might be able to spell Pena against an elite LHP at 1st occasionally. And with Dempster, Zambrano, Garza…they could elect for a 6 man pen and a 6 deep bench at least until the 5th starter is fully necessary (usually week 3-4 of the season). And if he doesn’t work out, you just cut him.

Well you could take 5 minutes to look up his numbers on Baseball-Reference.com instead of just making up statistics. He actually has thrown out 25% of runners for his career and has a career BA of .268. “there the proof” Never another season like his rookie year? Well last year’s .280/.393/.497 line looks pretty similar to his .285/.364/.504 line from his rookie year. Pretty weird that he actually went up hill in 2010, but I’m sure you’re right.

Well you could take 5 minutes to look up his numbers on Baseball-Reference.com instead of just making up statistics. He actually has thrown out 25% of runners for his career and has a career BA of .268. “there the proof” Never another season like his rookie year? Well last year’s .280/.393/.497 line looks pretty similar to his .285/.364/.504 line from his rookie year. Pretty weird that he actually went up hill in 2010, but I’m sure you’re right.

He isn’t done yet, he is too good to be on the waiver wire lol. so yep until he gets tothe absolute worst team in the league i wont be surprised of waiver claims. Not to mention u can never have to many catchers.
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So you’re saying the Sox should have just waived Atchison — a guy 100% certain to be claimed now by another team — rather than waiting until Spring Training when (a) Theo could trade him on a very club-friendly contract to a team needing bullpen help, (b) the Sox would stand a better chance of getting him through waivers just before the season when a lot of MLB clubs are already setting their rosters up, or (c) a bullpen injury might create a need for him on the Sox.

I am betting Varitek starts against more than a few LH pitchers too, since he usually still puts up decent numbers against LH pitching. Put Lowrie in the lineup for Scuturo and Cameron in for Drew or Ortiz and the Sox lineup against LH pitching still looks pretty good.

I don’t know if that part was directed at me or not but I’m not angry at all. I actually thought it would be Atchison who was DFA’d too, and I was kind of surprised that it was Ramirez instead. I just don’t think that Ramirez was all that valuable either so in my opinion he wasn’t much of a loss, he’s basically a project at this point and wouldn’t have had much of a place on the big league club so they probably thought it was worth the risk because if he went unclaimed they could put him in the minors.

Atchison had a 46% ground ball rate on balls in play. Unfortunately the Sox were missing Youkilis and Pedroia, both plus defenders, for much of the year. Meanwhile their 3B-SS defense also took a step back with Scutaro and Beltre (who, despite his incredible athleticism, is one of the worst-disciplined third basemen in the game with crappy footwork and decision making). What this means for Atchison is that had he had a better defense behind him, that GB rate would have resulted in a far lower ERA than the 4.50 he was assessed.

How far? Well, in his final 5 games he was charged with 8 ER that scored on 9 singles and 3 walks, and 8 of those hits were dribblers through the infield gaps. Prior to that, Atchison had put up a 2.91 ERA, a .229/.283/.353/.636 batting line, and a 2.58 K/BB in his previous 31 games. Yup, that screams “replacement level for slightly more than replacement cost”.

But please, continue to refer to stats on the back of your bubble gum cards when you assess ballplayers.

FIP doesn’t “measure” anything. It’s a calculation, and it’s based primarily on BABIP. It predicts what a pitcher’s ERA might have been had he pitched to a league-average BABIP, in this case the .295 for 2010 AL and not the .277 on Atchison’s ledger.

The point you’re missing is that Atchison’s GB rate would have gotten him an even LOWER BABIP had it not been for the routine grounders that eluded his defenders. But that means his FIP would have been even HIGHER. Yup, the FIP stat, as cool and awesome as it seems, is inherently flawed. It penalizes pitchers whose tendencies can actually create poor quality of contact on batted balls. It’s nice for helping to see where fly-ball pitchers might have been hurt by slow outfielders unable to track down balls that too often fell for hits, but it’s worthless for evaluating guys who generate more grounders.

FIP adds a full run to Mariano Rivera’s 1.81 ERA last year. His GB/FB rate was 1.07 while the AL average was 0.79. Do you really believe that with the two-toed sloth playing shortstop for the Yankees, Rivera was helped by his defense to the tune of a run per 9 innings? Do you honestly think it was that rather than his cutter flummoxing batters and inducing weakly-hit balls? Seriously??

Nice to see you’ve moved on from trading cards to regurgitating numbers from Fangraphs that you don’t even understand. Please continue. I’m greatly enjoying this.